Yahoo Sports NC Lt. Gov. Mark Robinson endorses Trump’s White House return: Need a ‘warrior at helm’
NC GOP gubernatorial candidate Mark Robinson endorsed Donald Trump’s White House campaign on Friday, publicly backing the former president as Trump tries to reclaim the Republican Party’s presidential nomination.
Robinson chose a high-profile venue to give the endorsement, speaking from the stage of the Faith & Freedom Coalition conference in Washington, a gathering of religious conservatives from across the country.
The lieutenant governor, who faces a competitive primary himself, said the country needs a leader who “is willing to go on the world stage walking boldly, strongly waving the American flag and say the Americans are here and we are in charge again.”
“This nation is at war, and we need a warrior at the helm,” Robinson said, earning a thunderous standing ovation from the audience.
Robinson’s endorsement calculated?
Robinson endorsed Trump over a slate of other GOP presidential candidates, including Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis, U.S. Sen. Tim Scott of South Carolina, former Vice President Mike Pence and former South Carolina Gov. Nikki Haley. Many of them, including Pence and Scott, also spoke from the same conference in Washington on Friday.
Robinson’s support appears to be a calculated move to align himself with Trump as the lieutenant governor seeks to gain the support of the same Trump loyalists who have made the former president the front-runner for the GOP’s presidential nomination in 2024. While it’s early, polling shows Robinson as the frontrunner for the 2024 GOP nomination.
His endorsement also reciprocates a favor: Trump pledged to endorse Robinson in his bid for the state’s top office during this month’s NC GOP convention in Greensboro. Robinson, the state’s first Black lieutenant governor, would make similar history if elected to the state’s top spot.
He’s quickly become one of the state’s most influential, and often controversial, voices in NC Republican politics for his views on social issues and current events — from race and sexuality to school shootings. Robinson offered a robust defense of those positions, including a belief that “there’s only two genders,” saying that it’s his political opponents on the left who are the true extremists.
“Ordinary looks crazy to the insane. What we’re facing is the insane,” Robinson said. “So if they want to call me crazy, they want to call you crazy, let them call us that. I look crazy to you because you’re insane.”
Law and order
Trump, who lost the 2020 presidential election, has repeatedly and baselessly insisted he was cheated out of a second term, a claim courts have rejected dozens of times. Robinson, however, did not address Trump’s election denial, pointing instead to the dueling set of charges against the former president he said were proof that America’s justice system had become similar to one operated under Adolf Hitler in Nazi Germany.
“Law and order has been destroyed, and we have a two-tiered justice system that has been weaponized against political enemies, much like it was during Hitler’s reign,” Robinson said.
Trump faces two sets of charges against him: In March, he was indicted by a Manhattan grand jury over allegations related to hush-money payments to an adult film actress. Earlier this month, he was charged by federal prosecutors with mishandling classified documents.
